Sunday, July 26, 2009

We the People are the bosses

The economic turmoil we're currently enduring, the sub-prime mortgage problems, the widespread foreclosures, etc. were caused by the government. It was the 'Community Reinvestment Act' that encouraged the banks to give artificially low rates to people that couldn't possibly repay their loans. It was Congressman Barney Frank that blocked attempts by Senator McCain and President Bush to reign in Fannie and Freddie. It was interference by the Federal Government, all in the name of "fairness", that brought us to where we were last year.

Then the Federal Government, led by George W. Bush and Treasury Secretary Paulson, decided they would fix the problem that the government created in the first place, by using our tax dollars to bailout banks and supposedly the people that never should have been given loans in the first place. We were told the sky was falling. We were told that if we did nothing things would get far worse.

To the credit of the public, we knew this was a bad idea and we spoke out loudly. We said "NO". Initially, the House of Representatives didn't pass the first TARP, but under political pressure they did pass an even bigger TARP the second time around. They defied the people they work for. But despite the TARP, foreclosures continued and the government got into the banking business.

Next came bailouts for the auto industry. Again, the public said "NO". We knew that picking winners and losers isn't the job of the Federal Government, in fact it's unconstitutional. If in a free market society a company fails, then it files for Chapter 7 or Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. But again, the President, the Treasury Secretary and the Congress ignored us and did what they wanted. The result? GM and Chrysler not only went into bankruptcy (after tens of billions of taxpayer money went down the drain), but the UAW and the Federal Government became the major owners of the company. Oh and in the process, the President of the United States intimidated the secured bond holders of Chrysler into taking pennies on the dollar and made them the bad guys in the media and court of public opinion. When did it become wrong in this country to expect contracts to be honored and for investors to want to make a profit?

After Obama's inauguration he called for more TARP money and a $787 billion "stimulus" package. Despite continued opposition from the public the TARP 2 was passed and the largest spending bill in our nation's history was passed, without a single member of Congress reading it. In addition, the bill was mostly pet projects, pork barrel spending and very little to actually stimulate the private sector. The so-called stimulus has only stimulated the growth of the Federal Government and a rise in the unemployment rate. In fact the President said that without the stimulus the unemployment rate would go over 8%. Well guess what? With the "stimulus" the unemployment rate is at 9.4%. The only place that unemployment is down is in Washington, DC.

I keep hearing the President telling us that the problem is the unscrupulous bankers, the evil bond holders, the CEO's of the automakers, etc. No mention of labor unions that demanded unsustainable benefits for current and retired employees. This president vilifies anyone in the private sector that is in the way of his agenda. His agenda unfortunately is to grow the Federal Government and give it powers that the Constitution does NOT grant it.

It is not intelligent or logical to conclude that the incompetent, bureaucratic and politically motivated people that got us into this mess are going get us out of it. In fact it's foolish to think that's even their intention. All signs are that what the President and his liberal allies in the House and Senate want, is to take and keep tremendous and unprecedented power for the government and themselves. They can't really believe that spending trillions of dollars, that they're borrowing since we don't have it, is going to get us out of this recession, can they? Apparently they do believe that the public is stupid enough to buy that idea though.

The bottom line is the very people that got this nation into this economic trouble are only making it worse and are ignoring, no defying the people they're supposed to represent. The good news is we don't have to take it. Despite what they seem to think, they work for US! We can take back the US House and Senate, one seat at a time. From the grassroots, we the people can select the candidates that will represent us. We need to throw the bums out. There are a select few currently serving in Congress that understand that the people are the bosses and the members of Congress are our employees. People like Rep. Thaddeus McCotter and Rep. Michele Bachmann are standing up for us. But they are sorely outnumbered. They need us to send reinforcements.

Write your US Senators and member of the House. Write to the President. Write letters to the editor of your local newspapers too. Let them all know, we've had enough. We want the out of control spending and unprecedented government growth to stop, now. We want them to listen to their bosses, or we will fire them. This isn't about parties, since both parties are guilty of ignoring us. This is about right and wrong. This about the Constitution.

Music for CRF used by permission of:

About Me

Steve is a fiscal & constitutional conservative. He joined the Republican Party to try to return it to it's core conservative principles of smaller government, lower taxes, states rights, adherence to the Constitution and accountability of both our representatives and the government in general.
In addition to hosting 'Conservative Republican Forum' on BTR, he is also a contributor to Parcbench.com. He was the 2010 GOP nominee for Florida State House in District 89 as well.
He's an American first, a Conservative second and a Republican third.